OK understand other comments - I am new to the encoding/decoding world. I tried just using decode, but it still did not work. Here is a sample of the xml - I have NO control over how this stuff is output - my client gives me the xml and I need to parse it. My errors are on the "^Ls3weNp2Y" input - when I initially try to decode it: 
$confile = decode("iso-8859-1", $file);
my $parser = XML::LibXML->new();
my $doc = $parser->parse_file($confile);

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Here is xml file... 
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" standalone="yes" ?>
<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="notes.xsl"?>
<UPDATE>
<COMMANDPARMS>
</COMMANDPARMS>
<TIMING>
<CUSTID> 192343-13</CUSTID>
<STARTDATE>20090414</STARTDATE><STARTTIME>10:36:46</STARTTIME>
</TIMING>

<TMMR><DATE>20090414</DATE><TIME>18:40:39</TIME><CEO_ID>12943-56A</CEO
+_ID><CEO_ID_SORTED>217.064.098.066</CEO_ID_SORTED><MANUID>80</MANUID>
+<STATUS>Open</STATUS><NOTES><![CDATA[Last checked on 14Aug
]]></NOTES><SERVICE_INFO><![CDATA[:^Ls3weNp2Y
]]></SERVICE_INFO><CONTENT1><![CDATA[]]></CONTENT1><CONTENT2><![CDATA[
+]]></CONTENT2></TMMR>

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In reply to Re^2: parse xml file using libxml - and Text:Iconv by kathys39
in thread parse xml file using libxml - and Text:Iconv by kathys39

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